Home-grown martyrs of the West Bank reap deadly harvest

Residents of Jenin used to be known for producing fruit and vegetables. Now they are renowned for their crop of suicide bombers, writes Philip Jacobson

12:01AM BST 19 Aug 2001

TUCKED away in the far north-western corner of territory under the full control of Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority, Jenin stands on a green and fertile plain. Half-empty in the blazing midday heat, the dusty little West Bank town appears at first to be an unlikely breeding ground for the deadliest of Islam's suicide bombers.

A blue-domed mosque overlooks the main street where faded signs advertise the local chicken tikka restaurant. It is only when you encounter the inhabitants of Jenin's sprawling refugee camp, where about a third of the 40,000 population live in wretched, sweltering squalor, that it becomes clearer why the town has the reputation as "capital of Palestinian martyrdom".

A week ago, Mohammed Mahmud Bakr Nasr walked into a cafe near Haifa and detonated a bomb, killing himself and injuring some 20 people.

"The message to Israel is quite simple," a young man close to the Islamic Jihad cell in Jenin town told The Telegraph last week. "Until you stop killing Palestinian civilians our bombers will continue to seek you out. However many you catch, there will always be others."

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Our meeting took place in the Jenin refugee camp that clings to a ridge above the town. "Look around and see how we live here," said the intermediary, a tall, bearded man. "Then maybe you will understand why there are always volunteers for martyrdom. Every good Muslim understands that it's better to die fighting Israel than live without hope."

When Israeli tanks rolled into town last Tuesday in retaliation for the recent suicide attacks, some residents of the camp strapped on belts of explosives ready to attack if they penetrated the warren of narrow streets and back alleys. Others hauled gas cylinders on to rooftops as improvised bombs.

While our contact disappeared to establish whether it might be possible to meet a bomber awaiting his mission, a teenage boy plucked at my sleeve. Through my interpreter he explained that he was the brother of Hussein Omar Abu Amsha, a 23-year-old Islamic Jihad volunteer who was initially identified as the pizza parlour bomber.

It only emerged later that a volunteer from the Hamas organisation's cell in Jenin had carried out the massacre. "At that moment I understood that my brother must also have been on a suicide mission and was now being hunted with his identity known to the security forces," the boy said.

"Of course that was very bad news, but I was still extremely proud of him for having volunteered. The whole family went to the mosque to pray that he, too, would accomplish his objective." So did he want to emulate his brother? "Of course, what else would you expect?"

After some delay, we were led deeper inside the camp to meet a wiry, intense man in his forties who said he was "authorised to speak for Islamic Jihad". A younger man sat beside him, silent and impassive. We were told not to speak to him directly.

It was no accident that Jenin is leading the way in suicide bombings, the spokesman explained. Unlike Palestinian centres of resistance such as Gaza, Nablus and Ramallah, the isolated rural town has no Jewish settlements nearby for militants to target.

When the current intifada, or uprising, began last September crowds attacked the Israeli forces stationed on Jenin's western outskirts. By the end of the year nearly 30 people had been killed in clashes with the military.

The Islamic militant organisations in Jenin quickly grew in strength, feeding on the bitterness and thirst for revenge against Israel. The town's first suicide bomber was Osmana Nimer Darwish, who died in an attack on an Israeli bus in May that wounded 60 people.

His stern bearded face appears on a commemorative mural at the entrance to the refugee camp. Other posters pay homage to Iyad Hardan, an Islamic Jihad leader who died in April when a telephone box outside the local jail that he used regularly blew up in what was assumed to be an Israeli-organised assassination involving Palestinian collaborators.

Such examples produced a rush of other would-be martyrs, said the spokesman, but Islamic Jihad recruiters were highly selective. It was not enough for a young man full of rage to offer himself once. Only if he volunteered a second time would he be accepted provisionally and then screened for his adherence to the precepts of Islam. "It is simple enough to teach someone how to trigger off a bomb around his waist, but harder to be sure that he understands the spiritual aspect of martyrdom."

In the office of the Jenin District Administration, briefly occupied by Israeli troops last week, Haider Irsheid, the deputy governor, told us how delighted local people were about their community's "frontline role" in Palestinian resistance.

Close to his office, bulldozers were clearing the site of the central police station flattened during the Israeli raids. Paramilitary security officers looked on.

"Welcome to undefeated Jenin," one of them called out. "Tell your readers that whatever the Israelis destroy here, we will rebuild again and again and again."